Spots on my Phal?

[trendkill]

I am very new to this Orchid hobby. My boyfriend bought me an orchid last week and I fell in love with it, so much, I went out and bought another one. Well he has worked with plants for quite some time and I did not heed his warning that taking care of orchids can be a challege..

Purple Phal was fine and dandy until I brought spotted Phal home..I think (I may not have noticed any imperfections until reading so much info on the web)


Spotted Phal...damn you...when I picked spotted Phal. I picked the prettiest one at the grocery store. At the time I was oblivious to what a "healthy" plant looked like. I got it home and I noticed a bunch of spots on the underside of the leaves. They travel up the center of it and long the side of the leaves. I have pictures but can not post them right now.

Does anyone know what it is?

[mehitabel]

Try wiping the "spots" off with a soapy paper towerl. If they wipe off, they are pests, probably scale.

[trendkill]

No they are like on the leaf. Almost like a discoloration. The leaf is green on top and on the underside and on the "stalk" part of it it has these purple/brownish spots.

[janet_a]

what color are the flowers? some dark colored phals have purplish pigment in their leaves---but it's usually not confined to the bottoms.

[mayres]

A few more short posts (I think you need 5 now?) and you can post a pic - that will help a lot.

[trendkill]

The one that is showing these spots is a yellow and pink spotted Phal.

[trendkill]

I'm at work I will post pictures when i get home

[trendkill]

This is the 5th post I will post when I get home.

[trendkill]

I noticed that there are like small black holes on the leaves. I will have to take some pictures later. Should I seperate my 2 orchids?

[trendkill]

[mayres]

Whoa!
Not quite in focus - can you try again?
From what I can't see I'm guessing you just have reddish coloring caused from pushing the lighting - which is common on phals that have pink/red/magenta coloring in their flowers. If what I "don't see" is correct this might be normal and of no concern as long as you don't go too far on the lighting.......

[trendkill]

Yeah I know. I don't have a DSLR so a Point and Shoot is what I'm working with. But, yes it's that magenta coloring on the leaves. It's like a pigment on them. I just noticed that the orchid in question has some black holes in its leaves. What should I do?

[janet_a]

from what i can see, don't worry about the pigment.

are the holes hard or soft? if they're hard and dry, i wouldn't worry about it; if they're soft and mushy, then you've got some issues.

[trendkill]

I can't really tell at this point one looks hard and dry the other looks soft and mushsy. I have no idea what it is. I am glad the pigment is nothing to worry about. I really love my orchids.

[Dendian]

Anything that feels soft and mushy is something to take off the plant and be worried about. I lost the center of one Phal to crown rot, lost two top leaves, but I hope to have stopped it with hydrogen peroxide and then Physan 20. If not stopped, it can kill the whole plant. The flowers look fine, haven't missed a beat, but the plant will still die.

I have several Phals with red flowers and all of them have a red coloration on the back of their leaves. Probably in their ancestry, maybe cause the light is bright. All I know is they are getting huge and are very happy.

You might be able to get a better picture if you use a trick from the photography 101 for newbies thread, and put a piece of white paper right next to the leaf, push the button half-way down on the camera so it focuses on the paper and not the back walls (as the first shot did) and then move the paper and point the camera at the leaf (still holding the button half-way down) and then push the button all the way. If it won't focus, then you will have to figure out how to change to close-up mode (usually looks like a flower) so it can focus that close. That way we can see better what you are describing.